The Election is over !

Clark Chapin, 5349 and I got 1366, that is 20.3% of the vote
Thanks to all who stood out in the cold at polling stations, and those who went door to door with me, and those who helped in many other ways including having a sign in their yard. The astute reader will realise that getting over 20% of the vote is significant.

News Times Report

Where to Vote (find out the easy way}

go to raiseyourvote.com

ASBO's anyone?

Prison policy reform is a difficult issue, touching as it does on alcoholism, drug abuse, mental health issues. learning disabiolities and the list goes on. However what about people who are abusivel, drunk and disorderly, terrorising the neighbors to the point that they want to move, but not really committing any offence that they can reasonably be imprisoned for?. Whar about an ASBO? (Antisocial Behavior Order)
I am not necessarily advocating them, because they can be used when appropriate treatment of the underlying problem would be better, but it should be one of the options explored in a thoroughgoing review of prison policy

Limited Platform?

The Spectrum said that I presented a limited platform. This is post No 46 or thereabouts on perhaps not quite 46 different issued but a good number, so if there is a substantive issue I have not covered, please call me or leave a comment and I will make sure it is covered before Election Day
However the true irony is that I am running because everyone else is presenting a limited platform. No one has anything to say about the #1 job killer in our State, drug trade fuelled violence in out cities, nor the #1 preventable money sink, keeping 18,500 people in prison, a good number of whom are non violent and could be dealt with or treated in other ways. Let others talk about this and then we can talk about who has the limited platform.

Help the Campaign

Yard Signs
If you want a sign on your lawn there is still time. Please call 203 417 3978

Donate
If you want to donate up to $50, please send a check made out to "Green67" and send to William J Mahar, Treasurer, Nicholas Payne 2010, 1 Tamarack Rd, New Milford, Ct. 06776.
Over $50 please call me on 203 417 3978 or go to green67.org to download the form we need to have filled in
It doesn't have to be before Election Day, any day before the end of the yeat is fine.
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Help on Election Day
Help is needed to stand duty at polling stations handing out literature. Again please call me 203 417 3978

The Connecticut Council of Police Endorsement

I am honored to be endorsed by AFSCME Council 15, the Connecticut Council of Police, for my commitment to collective bargaining rights and my desire to ensure that the Police are adequately compensated for the demanding and sometimes dangerous work that they do protecting the public.

Guns and your Second Amendment Rights

I said I would talk about guns and have spoken to people on both sides of the issue, so here is my considered opinion.
More gun laws in general inconvenience the law abiding, while being ignored by the criminal. The problem is not guns per se, because the state of Wyoming is knee deep in guns, but has one of the lowest murder rates in the country.
The problem is illegal guns and all the gun crime in our cities. Big city mayors want more restrictions on gun onwnership and you can sympathise with them, because of course they hate the carnage in their cities. Gun owners fear that one day the mayors and their supporters in Congress might pass stringent federal controls on gun ownership. The NRA views any restriction as anathema, appearing heartless and deaf to the wails of the mothers grieving for their murdered children. So what to do? As it happens I have already touched on the solution. By working on eliminating the illegal drugs trade by legalizing marijuana and providing heroin to addicts in relapse and other measures, drug trade fueled gun violence will diminish to the point that big city mayors will no longer see any reason to push for gun ownership restrictions and people will start to forget what the Second Amendment is all about. This is Green Party policy, which is so brilliant, it actually secures your Second Amendment rights just as a side effect of its main goal and does it more effectively than the NRA ever could for all the their bombast and bluster.
Just to clarify, people have asked me about my views on the Second Amendment. However, remember this is the Second Amendment to the US Consitution which reads
" A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed"
However I am running for the Connecticut State House so the relevant clause of the Connecticut Constitution Article I, Section 15 reads
" Every citizen has a right to bear arms in defense of himself and the state" and that is the Constitution that if elected I will swear to uphold and defend.
So there you have it. Vote Green November 2nd and as well as all the other brilliant benefits Green Party policy will bring, you will actually get your gun rights secured better than the NRA ever can. I also want to make clear that the Green Party is the Peace Party and is against people shooting each other for any reason.

The Flyer - Main Points of My Campaign

Vote Nicholas Payne for State Representative
(67th District)

Vote Green, November 2nd, for more Green in your pocket!

The Connecticut $3 billion Budget Hole and JOBS, JOBS, JOBS
Debate On CTV 21 Mon 10/25 12.30pm, and Fri 10/29 5pm
Wrap up Many items were discussed in the debate and my impression is that my opponent Clark Chapin is as smart and diligent as any legislator in Hartford, if not more so. However, when asked how he would fill the Budget Hole, he came up with a few cuts that would at most amount to a few million dollars. This says to me, that neither the Republicans nor the Democrats up in Hartford have a clue what to do. I, however have a plan.

Taxes kill jobs. Welcome to your new property tax bill. (New York style) There is a $3 billion hole in the Connecticut state budget for each year moving forward and you are going to fill it. The State cannot borrow more money, so the only thing left to do is to slash aid to towns, so the $16.1 million that the State would pay to New Milford starts to go bye bye, hiking property tax by up to 25%. I say, before soaking the towns the State should fix the cities and nothing should be off the table. Two key issues are drug policy reform and prison reform, two issues nobody wants to talk about..
The Plan I propose measures to bring peace and tranquility to our cities. The current epidemic of crime and violence is in truth a very heavy burden on our depleted pockets. Apart from the obvious costs of prosecuting and locking up offenders, there are the much greater costs engendered by widespread poverty and hopelessness. Connecticut while one of the wealthiest states in the union has some of the poorest cities. Bringing peace and tranquility will also cause a surge in economic activity and a renewed flow of taxes to fill the Budget Hole.
To do this I propose to wind down the so called War on Drugs and replace it with more effective policies. As you know illegal drug dealing is responsible for so much of the violence and crime in our cities. This I propose should be done in stages. First legalize marijuana and treat it like alcohol for adults. We want the police to be able to expend 100% of their effort in getting drug dealers out of places like Schaghticoke School
Switch to Portuguese style Dissuasion Commissions for hard drug users. This is a judge, social worker and psychologist who work with the user to try and get them into treatment and then providing heroin under medical supervision to addicts during relapses. This is a better than buying it on the street and will take a huge chunk out of the violent drug trade.
No one wants to talk about drugs, prisons and guns, but that is where the money is to be saved.

Prisons 30 years ago there were 3,500 people in Connecticut’s prisons, now there are 18,500, at a cost similar to going to Yale. In some neighborhoods 1 man in 10 is in prison which, to put it bluntly means there are 9 men to 10 women. We know enough about human nature, to know that this is a perfect recipe for broken families and lots of new criminals to lock up in the future, keeping the system going.
Backing out of this mess is going to be difficult, because we must lock up violent criminals. However, it has to be done because the taxes to support all this are killing jobs. Drug policy reform will be key to this.

Jamie Oliver !
I will vigorously support at the State Level efforts to bring healthier school lunches to all our school children

Education Equality
Provide more state funding for education, which will save on property taxes which mainly pays for it now. The will reduce the difference between rich and poor schools and reduce pockets of poverty which we pay for in other ways now.
Environment
I endorse the agenda of the Connecticut Fund for the Environment.
Bicycles
Make Connecticut more bicycle friendly (within reason). Think how a dedicated bicycle lane on the fast section of Rte 7 from Lanesville Road to the Brookfield border would have helped. Also add sidewalks on Grove St.
Read my blog for updates and discussions of other issues.
Green67.blogspot.com or watch the debate on CTV21
Email nwpayne@earthlink.net, cell 203 417 3978, web green67.org

Debate on CTV 21

Today Thursday 5pm CTV21 !

Closing Statement

Closing Statement and thanks to the New Milford Library for providing the space, Scott Benjamin the Moderator and the Housatonic Times for sponsoring the debate and my opponent Clark Chapin for his reasoned arguments and coverage of the issues and thanks to everyone who showed up.

State Employee Give backs more discussion

Protect those with demanding jobs and whose life is on the line

State Employee Give backs

The economy is a delicate animal, a balance of competing forces. Every businessman wants his wages costs to be low so that he can make a profit making his stuff, but he wants everyone else's wages to be high, so people have money to buy his stuff. A race to the bottom where wages are cut and cut is in nobodys' interest. But state employees are being paid by the taxpayer who is not as flush with cash as heretofore, so some concessions on perhaps an overly generous contract is fair.

The East West Connector

This road might actually increase traffic in town. We should look for cheaper fixes, like rerouting Youngs Field Road via Patriots' Way, to increase safety in the Park and to remove traffic congestion on the bridge. Also we should put a sidewalk the entire length of Grove Street and Route 7 through the business distirict

Farmland Preservation

The issue of farmland preservation, there is broad agreement here

Electricity, Rebuttal of Clark Chapin's Response

Rebuttal of Clark Chapin's Response

How to lower electricity rates

How to lower electricity rates and enhance the reliability of the grid and protect against blackouts

Education Rebuttal of Clark Chapin's Response

Rebuttal of Clark Chapin's Response

Education

How to improve education

Budget Defict, Rebuttal of Clark Chapin's Response

Rebuttal of Clark Chapin's Response

The question of the $3 billion budget deficit. I have a plan to fix it without raising your taxes

Debate - Opening Statement

The Opening Statement

Debate on CTV 21

Times are Mon 10/18 and 10/25 12.30pm, Wed 10/20 and Fri 10/29 5pm
Set your DVR ! Length is about an hour

Gun Control

Since it is so easy to traffic guns from state to state, this is largely a federal matter, but there are a couple of issues that need attention. One is that those who have a protection order against them in a domestic violence situation are no longer permitted to buy a gun for the duration , but there is no provision in State Law for guns they already possess be removed from them for safe keeping. I want to change that.
Another issue is that there was a bill in the legislature to require gun owners who lose their guns or have them stolen to report it to the police. Unless you are in the habit of losing guns, this is perhaps once in a lifetime experience and so hardly an onerous requirement. However my opponent voted against it. Apparently for some, a stellar rating with the NRA is important. For me I would seek only one stellar rating, and that is from the citizens of the 67th district

Road Safety

Traffic Deaths are still too high in the State. I want more money to the Police to crack down on DUI and investigate new technology to make sobriety check points easier to run.
Also, I note my opponent voted against Motorcycle Training Courses for new licensees. These are particularly effective at reducing the number and severity of motorcycle accidents. Freedom to roam the roads is one thing, but the freedom to roam untutored and likely have others to pay to put you back in one piece is another matter altogether

Immigration

There is a lot of holier than thou on this subject . We must remember that for every immigrant that breaks a law of a country not his own, by coming here, there is an American who is willing to break the laws of his own country by hiring him. Also while the immigrant will break laws to choose poverty over destitution, the American will break the laws of his own country just to save a couple of bucks by not hiring his or her fellow countryman. That said we are adults and this is an adult problem to fix and we should never take out our frustrations over our inability to fix the problem on the kids. So I applaud the recent bill that the legislature passed giving the kids of illegal immigrants in- state tuition at state universities and I think it unfair of my opponent to vote against it. The kids did not ask to come here, they did the work, they got into college. So why should they be penalized?

Energy / Electricity

As you know Connecticut has the highest electricity rates in the Northeast. Obviously we must continue to make sure that we are not burdened with costs that should properly be born by somebody else, but we must not shortchange the long term reliability of the distribution grid.

Failure in this area can be expensive for business to endure or make provision for. I support an expanded state effort to subsidize solar power installations particularly in commercial buildings, since solar cells produce the most power precisely when and where it is needed most, that is on hot summer afternoons
and save money by reducing the strain on the grid when it would be otherwise stretched to the limit and liable to fail.

Health Care

Health care is driven by two forces, fear and the desire for choice and control.
Fear is the fear that you cannot get the proper treatment or if you do, the fear that it will bankrupt you. Beyond fear is the desire for choice and control over your health care. Therefore I support Sustinet as the first step on the road to a basic system that can cover everybody, a system that gets the job done and removes the element of fear from the health care equation, a Walmart system if you will. For those who prefer to shop at Lord and Taylor or Nordstrom, there will always be private insurers who can provide you with your every desire in the field of health care delivery. Such care is more costly to deliver but I want to make sure that these costs are paid by those who desire the ultimate level of choice, not those whose primary motivation is fear. My opponent voted against all health care legislation that came up. He may be happy with the current mess, I am not.

The Debate

Debate Wrap up
Many items were discussed in the debate and my impression is that my opponent Clark Chapin is as smart and diligent as any legislator in Hartford, if not more so. However, when asked how he would fill the Budget Hole, he came up with a few cuts that would at most amount to a few million dollars. This says to me that neither the Republicans nor the Democrats up in Hartford have a clue what to do.
They all feel powerless in face of the fiscal tsunami which is about to overwhelm them. It is the worst case scenarion. I know about worst case scenarios and I have a plan. My plan, as discussed in previous blog posts takes us into areas that not many are comfortable about talking, drugs, guns and prisons. This plan should result in annually roughly $1.5 billion in direct savings and $1.5 billion in new revenues derived from new economic activity which will result from the reduction of violence in our cities. Of course new economic activity means new jobs too.
(Watch it on CTV 21 Mon 10/18 and 10/25 12.30pm, Wed 10/20 and Fri 10/29 5pm )

Other items that came up
Farm Preservation
Yes we agree largely
East West Connector.
There is a hill in the way. Let us concentrate on modest traffic improvements, left turn lanes and such
Obama's idea to extend the school year. I think this is a terrible idea ( I suggested that Obama had lost his marbles on this one) Besides the extra 17 days will be in June and July and do all our schools have air conditioning? I think not, so there would be an attention deficit all around.

Reorganising State Government. First, let us look at the function of government and what it should and should not be doing before we consider the shape of it, otherwise it will be like reorganizing the deckchairs on the Titanic.
State Employee Give Backs. There is room for some here.

Education

We all know where are failing schools are. The New Milford School System of course has its faults but no one can say it is in crisis. No, the failing schools are in our cities. The prescription is variously to institute more testing, fire more teachers and adminsitrators for bad performance, longer school hours and all the rest. But this assumes that some mysterious reason, all the most ineffective teachers and administrators are drawn to the inner cities like moths to a flame. The reality is that the school can only do so much to outshine the neighborhood it is situated in. Lets reduce crime and violence in the neighborhoods and school performance will increase. Few say this because it is a lot nicer to talk about education than crime and violence.

Moldy Cheese

If you see mold on your cheese you might think you can just cut it out and eat the rest. However, you have just cut out the fruiting body, the invisible filaments have burrowed deep into the cheese. So it is with drug policy, its effects burrow deep and expensively into all aspects of society including prison, family stability, education, taxes, jobs and health care.

In case anyone asks, the Mayo Clinic on moldy cheese

The Global Economy

Thirty years ago this did not exist to the extent it does today. Two things have driven it, government policy and communicatons such as the Internet. As regards government policy, as in all foreign policy initiatives, there is a mixture of altruism and self interest. The altruism is in the sense that global markets and free trade can potentially benefit everybody and the self interest is in that, with the US being one of the best places to do business, it would benefit more than most. Jobs and investment would flow more to the US. However the self interest part is a double edged sword, it only works to the extent that the US is one of the best places to do business. If other countries up their game, which they have, we could find the jobs and investment flowing away. What in effect has happened is the world is more slippery and well lubricated, jobs and investment flow easily and quickly to where best business climate is to be found. What this means is that impediments to business, that we got away with in the past, will now lead to jobs and money fleeing the state. Taxes without services is an impediment to business like no other. Taxes that result in services are fine. Services include education, infrastructure improvements, research and development assistance, all things that make a state attractive to business. However Connecticut has a good line in taxes withour services. Prison is not a service that business or the general public can use. Chasing drug dealers also is not a service. That is why these policies must be reformed now, whereas in the good old days we could have and did get away with it.

Portugal 3, Italy 1

What does Portugal do pretty well, the Italians sort of do and the Dutch no more than also rans. Its not soccer, but drug policy.
Since 2001 in Portugal has had a policy where drug users are never put in jail, but are put in front of a tribunal whose purpose is to dissuade the user from drug use and get into treatment if necessary
Time Magazine Article

Some will say that that might work in a small country like Portugal, but not in the US. But we are not talking about the US, we are talking about Connecticut, population 3.5 million compared with Portugal population 11.5 million. It was the intent of the Founding Fathers that each state should be able to become a laboratory to try out ideas, which if successful could be subsequently spread to the whole country. However in Connecticut we have to go further. In Porugal as in most of Europe, gun crime is much lower and so is the violence associated with the drug trade.
The violence associated with the drug trade in this country has a huge economic impact.For this reason alone we must consider providing heroin and cocaine to addicts to avoid them getting it on the street. This is pragmatism. They are going to get it anyway and cost the rest of us money in the process. The drug trade is a millstone around our necks and we do not need millstones right now.

The Rebecca Payne Memorial Tennis Tournament

This event will take place at the Rebecca Payne Memorial Tennis Courts at Youngs Field October 9th 10th and 11th, the Columbus Day weekend. It will consist of Mens and Womens Singles and Doubles, for serious players, a fun Round Robin for those who cannot remember the last time they picked up a racket (if ever) and a Kids Tournament on the Monday. It will benefit the National Athletic Trainers Association Rebecca Payne Scholarship Fund which when fully endowed will give $2,000 annually to a student from the New England area studying Athletic Training. To be clear this is NOT a fundraiser for the Green Party or my candidacy, but I just wanted to let you know about it. Information at Rebecca Payne Tennis Tournament
Facebook Page

Debate Wednesday 6th October, Library

There will be a debate between Clark Chapin and myself at 7pm in the upstairs room at the Library. This is your opportunity to get your questions answered. The debate is being sponsored by the Housatonic Times

Is Prison a Drug?

In some neighborhouds one in 9 men is in prison. Let me put this simply. This means that there are 9 women to 8 men and human nature takes over, leading to unstable fanilies and children likely to grow up to be offenders themselves. So imprisoning people now means that we will have plenty of hoodlums to imprison in 2030 and imprisoning people next year means that we will have plenty more in 2031. Now there is no choice but to imprison violent crimainals, but in doing so we ensure that we must continue to do so. Just like a drug we must take it to feel good now, but in doing so we continue to feed our addiction. And we are getting more addicted, the prison population was 3,500 in 1980, but 19,000+ now. Some modest efforts have been made which have perhaps reduced the population by a 1,000 or so. However after the Cheshire home invasion, Governor Rell, and you have to sympathize with her, put a hold on the parole system, that left 300 people in prison who would have otherwise been out. Just like an addict having a bad day, we had a relapse. What we need is a "circuit breaker" to stop this endless cycle. Reforming drug policy is a big part of that. It does not fit neatly into a "sound bite", but the Green Party emphasizes sound thinking, not sound bites.

Veterans

We all know how at times Washington short changes our veterans, the brave men and women who fight for our freedom and the State of Connecticut does to some extent make up the slack, but more should be done.
Let's talk a little about modern warfare, particularly IED's. Actually these so called "shaped charges" were first developed by the Navy over 120 years ago. They work by creating an intense pressure wave that drives a slug of metal thtough the thickest armor. But this same pressure wave can travel through the human brain tearing apart neurons that took decades to connect themselves throughout the victim's life. The victim might show no outward sign of injury, but will never be the same again. These and more obvious injuries might need a lifetime of care and that we must do and if we do not, we should hang out heads in shame. I am not in favor of raising taxes, but if the only way to take proper care of our veterans was to raise taxes, I would vote for it in a heartbeat.

Guns

The shooting in Manchester today was another awful tragedy and our prayers go out to the victims families. I wasn't going to say much about guns. The reason is no matter what gun laws are in place in Connecticut, as long as you can buy a gun from a flea market in New Hampshire or a Gun Show in Maine with no checks whatever, the Connecticut laws don't matter that much. In this particular case we do not know if the gun was legal or not.
However the question keeps on coming up and I am talking to people in order to come up with a considered and researched position.

I have a booth at the Village Fair

Located down by the Bingo at the South end of the Green. Please come by and say hello.
Remember the Village Fair runs this Friday and Saturday and does not run on Sunday.
As well as Green Party and campaign literature, Rebecca's friends will be selling green bracelets "RIP Becca" to benefit the National Athletic Trainers Assocation Region 1 (New England) scholarship fund, to benefit an Athletic Training Junior or Senior Student. Also paintings by Karen Cohen the mother of one of Rebecca's best friends, commemorating Rebecca to benefit the same fund will be on sale
The Rebecca Paintings

I have a website

green67.org
This links to the Green Party, as well as showing you how to donate to my campaign.

Why am I running anyway

As some may know the initial impetus was the murder of our daughter Rebecca an 04 graduate of NMHS who went to Northeastern Univiersity and was shot dead in her apartment in Mission Hill, Boston, May 20th 2008. As the police investigation progressed, it became apparent that whe was not the intended target and was mistaken for someone else and she was not involved in any way in any illegal activity. People being sent to kill people they do not know is a feature of the illegal drugs business and if her killing was not directly related to that business, the illegal guns used almost certainly were. I have always been sceptical as to whether simply prohibiting drugs, while being perhaps a laudable aim is actually effective policy. But it had always appeared it was the sort of thing that governments do and there was not a lot that could be done about it. Now I have researched extensively on the subject and asked people what they thought about the War on Drugs and discovered two things. One is that academics and others who study it conclude that it is a waste of time and money and almost everyone I talk to agrees too.
New Milford is largely spared the violence connected with the War on Drugs, but we certainly pay for it. We pay for it three times. We pay for investigating crimes and locking up offenders. We pay for the social dysfunctiona and poverty caused by all the violence and we in effect make a down payment to make sure that we continue to pay for all these things well into the future, by creating the next generation of drug dealers. Now in 2010 we are in the middle of a recession and money is tight. This is the time we must stop wasting money on things that don't work and start doing things that do. There are a lot of things that need doing in Connectiuct in order to move forward with a vibrant economy and there is much more in the Green Party platform than ending the War on Drugs, but ending the War will give us the money to pay for all the good things we need. This is why I am running.

News Times article and Green mopeds

http://www.newstimes.com/local/article/Father-of-homicide-victim-challenges-Republican-577177.php.
It has been suggested that electric mopeds are not green. Up to a point that is true, because the electricity is likely made from coal, but it can be three times as efficient to burn fuel in a power station than in an internal combustion engine, There are of course losses in transmission and in the battery, so the efficiency and so the carbon footprint is only somewhat better than the internal combustion engine. However in the future electricity will come from mostly renewable and nucleat energy. But that day is far ahead and in the meantime battery technology needs to significantly improve. The electric moped is a very useful platform to help that happen. The Chinese appear to understand this better than we do. They have 22,000,000 electric mopeds, so on 22,000,000 batteries they have honed their technology and manufacturing skills. Watch out for their electric cars ! As your Green Party candidate I will push for these green technologies to be developed in Connecticut not China.

Connecticut 2050 Froum on Saturday 26th June

Chris Murphy your Representative in Congress ran a forum to think about ideas for how the state will look like in 2050. Ironically most of the attendees, myself included are unlikely to be around in 2050, but doing their civic duty to discuss what kind of state our children will inherit. Three subjects were under discussion Preservation of Open Space, Water and Transportation. All are important to a livable state. Connecticut is losing young professionals faster than any other state because our cities dont match up to New York and Boston. Too much violence has a much greater negative effect in a smaller city than a larger one. I've talked about that elsewhere. We need these people to head up the job-creating businesses of the future. Also people like a place they can walk around, don't always have to use the car. Connecticut is ahead of the game in this respect since most of our towns and cities came into being before the car was invented.
One further thing I would like to mention was the Tea Party protesters standing outside, clearly furious at Chris Murphy and everything he represents. You may feel as if the country is going to the dogs and no one cares. A lot of people have lost their jobs and it seems as if no one cares. The Green Party cares. The Green Party will not sell you a bill of goods, but real solutions to the problems facing us today

Martha Dean wants gun training in every school

Martha Dean is a lawyer from Avon running as a Republican for Attorney General. So it seems she would like another unfunded mandate, apparently so that everyone can enjoy their Second Amendment rights to the fullest. However, as it happens, gun training is quite simple
Start Gun Training:
"Never point a gun at anyone unless you intend to kill them"
End Gun Training.
So thats all you need to know about guns. If you want to know more, there are numerous sources of information.

The math just doesnt work

Why the Drug War cannot work.
There are about 110,000 people in Connecticut, who have used an illegal drug besides marijuana in the last month, mostly cocaine, Some are addicts and some casual users. Let us say that are serviced by about 2- 5000 drug dealers. The government with great hoo hah does a big drug bust and rounds up 20 of them for 2 years in prison each. This works out to be $50,000 per year for 40 yeas total =$2 million +$1 million odd in investigation and court costs. Total $3,000,000 Now there are around 200,000 unemployed in Connecticut, so tell me how long it takes to find 20 drug dealer wannabes among 200,000, 3 days?, a week?. The bottom line is no matter how much we would like to eliminate drugs by banning them, the math just doesn't work. It is like going to a car dealer, wanting to buy a new car, but telling the salesman that you can only afford $10 a month in payments. No matter how much you would like a new car and no matter how much the salesman would like to sell you one, the math just doesn't work.

Instant Runoff Voting Explained

The whole idea is that you can have your cake and eat it. You can vote with your heart for the candidate you like best and then vote with your head to keep the candidate you dislike out of office. In a recent example of the 2000 Presidential Race you could have voted for Ralph Nader without the fear of letting George Bush in, which is of course exactly what happened

In the voting booth you get to list the candidates in order of preference. You would have given Ralph Nader #1, and recognising that he was unlikely to win, you would have given your #2 preference to Al Gore. Neither candidate has a majority, Ralph Nader is eliminated along with your #1 preference and so your number #2 preference is turned into a vote for Al Gore who probably would have had enough to win. Note you still only get one vote.

My Platform

I am running for State Represetative in Hartford for the Connecticut 67th District which is roughly the eastern and southern parts of New Milford. Here is what I want to achieve as your Representative

Connecticut Budget Hole

The state faces unprecedented budget difficulties, difficulties in maintaining services while not raising taxes so that even more jobs are not chased away.
I propose measures to bring peace and tranquility to our cities, the current epidemic of crime and violence is in truth a very heavy burden on our depleted pockets. Apart from the obvious costs of prosecuting and locking up offenders, there are the much greater costs engendered by widespread poverty and hopelessness caused by violence. Connecticut while one of the wealthiest states in the union has some of the poorest cities. Bringing peace and tranquility will also cause a surge in economic activity and a renewed flow of taxes to fill the Budget Hole.
To do this I propose to wind down the so called War on Drugs and replace it with more effective policies, since illegal drug dealing is responsible for so much of the violence and crime in our cities. This I propose should be done in stages, since while many of the policies I propose are legislated or de facto in other parts of the country and the world, we have no way of knowing how they will work in Connecticut until they are tried. Thankfully the State of Connecticut sponsors a highly regarded Drug Policy Unit at Central Connecticut State University, whose recommendations I will largely follow.
1. Legalize marijuana for medical use, as in Maine, Rhode Island, New Jersey and 11 other states. Extend it to all use subsequently. California has a referendum on this in November, we may be able to follow their lead.
2. Experiment with providing heroin under medical supervision to heroin addicts. This is a better option for them than buying it on the street. There at least 700 other drugs available, so I propose that we extend this type of experiment to most of the main ones in order to knock the stuffing out of the illegal drugs trade with all its direct and knock on costs

Jamie Oliver !
I will vigorously support at the State Level efforts to bring healthier school lunches to all our school children

Get Connecticut back to work!
Stop Tax Giveaways that create jobs at $100,000 per job and support new and innovative industries that play to Connecticut's strengths, particualar in the Green Economy (renewable energy etc) which will be huge in the years ahead.

Better Democracy
There is no idea which is more dangerous to a Democracy than the idea that we have achieved it.
Public financing of elections as in Maine and Arizona. Keep the money out the picture. Connecticut tried, but the law needs fixing to be fairer to small parties.

Election Day registration as permitted in Maine, New Hampshire and 7 other states.

Allow prisoners to vote in the last five years of their term as in Vermont and Maine. These prisoners will soon be among us. Civic responsibility is an essential part of a prisoners rehabilitation.

Instant Runoff Voting. A little complicated this, allows you to vote with your heart as well as your head, read my blog entry for an explanation

Health
Pay for stop smoking programs using money from tobacco taxes. Connecticut is one of only five states that does not do this for Medicaid patients or require insurance companies to pay for it.

America loves socialist healthcare, so much so, that we have four systems and we spend more on it per head than many countries famous for their socialist healthcare.
The systems are Medicare, Medicaid, the VA System and the uninsured. The uninsured system is socialist because if you are uninsured, you wait until your situation is dire, go to the emergency room and the costs are passed on to everyone in a very socialist way. Given this love, I propose moving towards a single unified system that covers everybody, while of course everyone who wants private health care can still have it.

Education Equality
Provide more state funding for education, which will save on property taxes which mainly pays for it now. The will reduce the difference between rich and poor schools and reduce pockets of poverty which we pay for in other ways now.

Environment
I endorse the agenda of the Connecticut Fund for the Environment.
Bicycles
Make Connecticut more bicycle friendly (within reason). The hills of New Milford are not bicycle friendly, but think how a dedicated bicycle lane on the fast section of Rte 7 from Lanesville Road to the Brookfield border would help.

Pass enabling legislation to allow towns to tax land and buildings at different rates, this discourages sprawl and the need to expensively provide municipal services over a wide area.

Register to vote!

Following a political blog when you haven't registered to vote is a bit like watching the rev counter on a car with automatic transmission. Register at the Town Clerk's office which is at the back of the Town Hall (that great big red brick building on the Green). Talking of Green you can register for any party as your "'political affiliation" or simply be "Independent", It makes no difference, you can vote for any party you want in a General Election.... which is Tuesday Nov 2nd this year.